Designed and signed by Christo himself, the artist reveals the complete story of his and Jeanne-Claude’s extraordinary The Floating Piers of June–July 2016. On 846 pages, the artist presents preparatory drawings and collages, as well as important documents, engineering drawings, technical data, maps and more than 2,000 project photographs about the 16-day installation with 1.2 million visitors from around the globe.

PHOTO: WOLFGANG VOLZPHOTO: WOLFGANG VOLZ

From June 18 to July 3, 2016, 100 kilometers east of Milan and 200 kilometers west of Venice, The Floating Piers by Christo and Jeanne-Claude allowed 1.2 million people to walk on water. The project, comprising 100,000 square meters of shimmering saffron fabric above a modular floating dock system of 220,000 high-density polyethylene cubes created a three-kilometer walkway across the surface of Lake Iseo, connecting the mainland to the islands of Monte Isola and San Paolo.

“It is all about walking,” said Christo of the project. “Including the stretches on the land, you have to walk five kilometers to appreciate the project, the constantly changing views, the lake, the mountains, the other visitors. All these things together are the final artwork.” The experience was as tactile as it was visual, a multisensory wonder of undulating fabric, shimmering yellow, and ever-shifting light upon the water.

PHOTO: ANDRE GROSSMANN

This limited Art Edition combines the project book with a 24 x 24 cm swatch of the project’s original dahlia yellow fabric as well as the lithograph The Floating Piers, Lake Iseo, Italy, 2017. This stunning, grand scale aerial photograph by Wolfgang Volz is signed by Christo and includes an original sample of the project fabric.